'Me first,' he said with a big smile. 'Tell me . . . what is the naughtiest thing you've ever done? Go on; tell me something about yourself that I don't know.'
Oh shit.
'Go on. It can't be that bad,' he said, sensing my reluctance. 'Can it?'
'I got banned from driving for twelve months,' I said sheepishly.
'How fast were you going?' he asked.
'No, drink-driving. But I hadn't been drinking. Well, I had, but I didn't know I had. I mean, my drinks were spiked by this guy that Mandy was going out with. He didn't like the fact that I wasn't drinking and put loads of alcohol into this fruit punch and fed it to me all night. I drove home, was stopped by police and ended up getting banned. Luckily no one got hurt . . .'
Rufus was silent for a moment and then gave me a hug and a wry smile. 'Wow. I'm dating a convict,' he said. 'Did you have mugshots done and fingerprints taken and everything?'
'Oh yes. The whole works.'
'Poor thing. Right, come on. I know what'll cheer you up . . . I've saved the best till last. Come with me,' he said, taking my hand and whisking me away from the courtyard, past the maze, and out to a gorgeous rose garden. The smell as we approached was unbelievable, hanging in the air as the flowers smiled and basked in the afternoon sunshine.
The sun was shining. I was surrounded by beautiful roses. That's when I fell in love. Later I would call my friends and family and try to enthuse them about a rose garden in a palace on the banks of the river. I'd try to explain about the magical pull of the scents and the immediate sense of relaxation we'd both felt. I'd tell them about the smiling gardener called Frank who came over and said hello, resting wearily on his hoe as he admired his roses and grinned engagingly, telling Rufus it was so nice to see him again. 'It was paradise,' I'd sigh. There's no question that they all thought I'd gone mad.
Rufus led me past the benches dedicated by one devoted spouse to another to a bench with no dedication on it at all. 'This is my favourite bench,' he said, and I almost squealed out loud. A man with his favourite bench! Who'd have thought? 'I call it the bench with no name.' We sat holding hands in companionable silence for a few moments.
'So do you bring all your girls here?' I teased, fairly sure of the answer but I had to ask.
'You're the first and only.' He smiled back at me. 'You know I've always felt this was a very special place. But now it will be our special place. A place that only the two of us know about.'
We have a special place! Our place! All our own. And it's in a palace and it's full of roses! I looked up and saw butterflies playing beside us; fluttering their wings as if in courtship. The sentiments of the moment seemed to be reflected in the nature all around us.
'It's amazing! I love it. I love—' I broke off, scared of what I was in danger of revealing but Rufus kissed me again, giving me the courage to try. 'I mean . . . I think you should know I'm falling in love with you . . .'
'Good, because I feel exactly the same way.' He smiled. 'Only you should know what your getting yourself into, Kelly. My life is crazy. The press follow me most places. I have to guard my privacy where I can. I want to protect you from that craziness but once the press know we're together . . .' He paused. 'Once the press know we're together, life is going to get very difficult. Until you live through it, you have no idea how hard it is to cope with the constant intrusion.'
Rufus looked so serious all of a sudden, I was overcome with the need to lift him out of his solemn thoughtfulness.
'Whenever they upset us we'll come here,' I suggested, looking at the picture of beauty and solitude painted in the brightest colours all around us. 'We'll escape to the Rose Garden and hide in the bushes like squirrels and no one will find us.'
'That's a lovely thought,' Rufus said, flashing me that incredible smile of his and speaking with such love and warmth. 'From now on, this is our rose garden, our refuge. The place we first declared our love to one another and somewhere we'll always come when things get tough.'
I breathed deeply. 'We'll never, ever tell anyone about our rose garden, Rufus; it's just for us . . . our special place. I'll never breathe a word to anyone about it, then no one will know.'
I smiled then, feeling lost and dizzy in the thrill of the moment.
Chapter 4
EXCLUSIVE: FILM STAR SET TO MARRY AS
GIRLFRIEND HAS MASSIVE BOOB JOB
By Katie Joseph
Daily Post Showbiz Correspondent
Wedding bells will soon be ringing for Rufus George, as the steamy love affair between the hunky film star and his knockout English girlfriend, Kelly Monsoon, grows stronger by the day. As George plans the wedding of the decade, his stunning girlfriend is rumoured to have undergone a huge breast enlargement operation to please her man on their big day. According to sources close to the star, the loved-up couple have not been seen in public since they were spotted at a jewellery shop on Bond Street last weekend.
'We can't say what they purchased, but we can confirm that it was specially ordered and has three diamonds,' said a shop assistant.
The news indicates clearly that Hollywood's biggest star is preparing to propose to the drop-dead gorgeous Richmond theatre administrator who has captured his heart. Family and friends are expecting an announcement at tonight's dinner party, being hosted by Rufus at his mansion on Richmond Hill to honour his new girlfriend.
Meanwhile Kelly has been making sure that she looks as good as possible for the wedding of the year. The already busty lovely was seen entering London Valley Hospital, where many celebrities undergo breast implant operations. It's all an exciting new development in an exciting new world for Kelly. Don't forget to read our exclusive interview with Kelly's former boyfriend Greg Clarke in this Sunday's paper. 'She went like a train,' said Clarke. 'I've never had sex like it.' Lucky Rufus! Read more EXCLUSIVELY on Sunday.
Do you know Kelly Monsoon? If you do, call the Showbiz desk now on 020 7765 0064, or email [email protected]. We will pay for information and your identity can be kept secret.
'Whaaaaaaaat? Rufus, have you seen this?'
I can hardly believe my eyes. There, in a national newspaper read by millions of people (including my friends and family – I know this because they've been texting me a load of bloody insults all morning), is a chicane of complete lies about me. I went like a train? I hardly know Greg. He's just a barman who I went out for a drink with once. I never even kissed him, let alone slept with him, so I don't know how he knows that I 'go' like a train. Bloody hell. I'm no virgin but I definitely never slept with him!
And boob job? I mean – hello – of all the people in the world, I really don't need a boob job. I'm 34E for crying out loud, what would I inflate them to? I'd look like I had two footballs stuffed down the front of my shirt.
Rufus glances at the page I'm reading and raises his thick, black eyebrows. He looks like a man who's seen this sort of thing time and time again; which, to be fair, is exactly what he is.
'I've got people looking at them,' he says rather enigmatically.
'Looking at what? My boobs – the ones that I've apparently had inflated?'
'No, silly. I've got my lawyer looking at the allegations in the piece. Don't worry. There's nothing we can do now; the lawyers will act if there's anything to act on, if not, we'll put in measures to limit the chances of this sort of thing happening again. We'll try and stop them from printing the interview with your ex-boyfriend on Sunday.'
'He's not my ex.'
'Well, whoever he is . . . train man . . . we'll stop him talking about having sex with you.'
'I didn't have sex with him. Can we get this really clear, Rufus: he's not my ex-boyfriend and I didn't have sex with him.'
This is the thing with me and Rufus; he's polished, professional, never flustered, always calm and in control whereas I feel like squealing and running out and buying every single copy of the paper to make sure that no one else can see the lies they've written about us.
'I just don't believe
it,' I say, largely to myself, but Rufus hears and ruffles my hair affectionately.
'Don't you?' he says. 'Did you think we'd be left alone to develop our relationship in peace? I'm afraid I've had a working lifetime of this. They don't let up; they're always after stories, always wanting to hear more gossip. That's why we have to be careful who we trust.'
'I just didn't think it would be like this,' I say. And that's what I mean. I'm not stupid; I knew the journalists would want to write stories but it didn't occur to me that the newspapers would be this interested in the minutiae of our relationship until we appeared in public. I imagined that once we started going to events and parties together, the journalists would spy us and want to write about us but I just didn't expect this . . . I didn't imagine for a minute that if they couldn't find a story, they'd make one up!
I guess I thought I could control things; I thought that by not going out and not doing anything wrong, I'd be OK. I always realised that if I was caught falling out of a nightclub, taking drugs, or working in the slave trade, the story would hold extra interest because of my link to a film star, but I didn't think that by doing nothing, I'd still end up in the papers. As it is, I seem to be even more of a target for the media by not doing anything. Heat magazine announced that I was 'oops . . . too fat by far' this week, after they got a picture of me clambering out of the car. I nearly cried and realised, perhaps for the first time, that when you're looking at these pictures as a non-celebrity they seem harmless and fun. But when you're the target of the pictures, they feel like a real attack and very difficult to take. It's all so personal. I've never realised before how undermining and cruel so many of the jibes are in magazines.
As Rufus and I sit in the sitting room, looking at the latest missive from bloody Katie, my phone bleeps again.
'I no that's not true,' reads the text from Sophie. 'You've got the massive-ist knockers in the world.'
There's another bleep minutes later. It's Mandy texting on Sophie's mobile. She hates texting and, on the rare occasions when she does it, using someone else's phone, her messages are always spelt out in full and grammatically perfect. 'Are you OK? Call me if you want to talk. Love Mandy.'
'I guess I was naive,' I tell Rufus, and I guess I was. After all, I've been cutting pictures and articles about Rufus out of magazines since the day I met him. I, above everyone, should be well aware of how much publicity he gets.
'I went to the hospital to visit Great-Aunt Maude,' I tell Rufus. 'That's when they must have seen me and thought I was going for a boob job.'
'Listen. I don't want you to worry,' says Rufus in that calm way of his. It's OK for him; he's become immune to it over the years and he knows that his friends and family will know it's all made up. My mum read it and asked me whether my cup size had changed dramatically because she was planning on buying me a nightie for Christmas. 'Noooooo,' I said. 'It's all made up.'
'Are you sure?' she asked, as if this was something I might have had done and then forgotten about.'
'Yes, I'm sure. It's not true,' I said defiantly, but she wasn't having any of it.
'It must be true; it says so – in the paper. Go and buy it. It's there in black and white.'
Rufus can see I'm miles away; I'm mentally scanning through all the people who might have read the paper and establishing to what sort of conclusion they may have come. I'm forced out of my dreamlike state by the sound of Rufus's mobile.
'Courty!' he shouts into the phone. 'How ya doing, buddy?' There's a pause during which Rufus smiles from ear to ear as he listens to his friend recounting a story of some kind.
'Ha, ha, ha,' Rufus says in reply, his voice rising with every laugh. 'And you had it coming to you,' he adds, pointing abstractly at the wall as he does so. 'You had it coming, bud. Now, hold on, let me put you on loudspeaker so you can talk to Kelly . . . Can you still hear me?'
'Sure can, buddy.'
'Kelly, say hi to Mr Brad Court, one of my oldest friends.'
'Hey, less of the "old", Tarzan,' says 'Courty', adding: 'Kelly, are you there?'
'Hello,' I say nervously. 'Nice to talk to you.'
'Hey, it's great to talk to you too,' he says. 'How's it going with old misery chops?'
'Hey,' Rufus shouts, over my shoulder. 'Watch it.'
'It's going OK actually,' I say. 'He hasn't introduced me to the world of baseball yet though; I understand you're a real fan.'
'God, I love your accent,' he swoons. 'It's soooo sexy.'
'Enough,' shouts Rufus over my shoulder, taking the phone. 'I need time alone with the accent now, so you, my friend, are history. Talk soon, buddy.'
'Sure thing,' says Courty. 'Nice to talk to you, Kelly. If you're as hot as your accent then Rufus must be one hell of a —'
Gone. Rufus cuts his friend off in his prime and tucks the phone back into his trouser pocket, looking over at me.
'Courty's a really nice guy. He's a proper, decent, honest guy; he's like your friends Mandy and Sophie. People like that don't worry about what's in the paper. They know the real person behind the headlines and they take no notice. Don't worry too much about what the likes of Katie Joseph write. She's really not worth worrying about. Just concentrate on having a lovely time today, getting ready for the party tonight,' he says. 'Remember Elody's coming over to meet you at 3 pm. I'll be at a lunch, but she's eager to meet you before tonight.'
'A lunch? Oh . . .' I hear myself saying. I've spent the past week nailed to my boyfriend's side; it feels odd that he's going out without me.
'Yep. I have to; a work thing,' he says, before standing up and walking towards the door. 'It's about a new role and to firm up details for a promo tour. All very dull . . . but I have to go, sweets. Anyway, you'll have tons to do before the party tonight, won't you? I know what you girls are like.'
Tonight – ah yes, the party I've been dreading since I arrived here a week ago. I secretly hoped that Rufus might want to cancel the party after the article in the paper this morning. 'We can't do the party now, dear, can we?' I say, before urging with childlike unreasonableness for him to abandon all plans for the event that a team of eight has worked for a week to organise.
'It'll be fine, don't you worry,' he says whenever I object or admit to my fears of being judged by his rich and famous friends. 'They'll love you like I do.'
The party is where I get to meet some of the neighbours on the Hill. Rufus has chosen some of those whom he thinks I'll get on best with, just to give me a gentle introduction to his friends. Before arriving here I was desperate to see them, mingle with them and join this exclusive set, but now I just want to stay inside with Rufus and not meet anyone. Ever.
Three couples are coming tonight, along with Elody – the brilliant, brilliant Parisian stylist. She's the one who used to set all the trends around the world by dressing the most glamorous and influential of people. You know – the one who was half of the madly famous 'Jelody' fashion couple with Jon Boycott, the fashion designer. He created beautiful clothes and she dressed the world's biggest stars in them. They had the perfect relationship; they were both incredibly attractive – he with his skinny, weathered but incredibly sexy look, and she with her immaculate eye for detail and her innate flamboyancy. They made millions. I remember reading about them when I was a teenager and thinking that they had the perfect life. They dominated the fashion world until he died, suddenly, a few years ago from a drugs overdose. His death turned him into a legend, but it turned Elody into a shadow of her former self and, if what I read is true, she's never got over losing him. It's made her a little 'brittle' (Rufus's word) and she is quite a sad, lonely figure these days. She doesn't work much any more, not that she needs to financially, and has few friends whom she trusts.
'She needs people around her who care,' said Rufus. 'I don't know her too well but she's a doll,' he insists.
All I know about her is that she oozes sophistication. She is a byword for cool, urban chic (see, I've been Googling her, too, I know all the lingo).
I find myself hoping, madly, that she wants to be my friend. Luckily I've got the beautiful grey dress that the girls bought me as a leaving present, so I should impress her when it comes to talking party wear, and I now have the world's most outstanding necklace and bangle to wear too. She'll be really bloody impressed when she sees me.
'I'm looking forward to meeting her,' I tell Rufus, loving the way he smiles at me, with such love and warmth.
One of the interesting lessons I've learnt this week about the rich, famous and beautiful residents of Richmond Hill is that they're a rather petty clique. I know the party planners have found it hellishly difficult to arrange tonight's little soirée because of the various in-fights going on in this exclusive set. You simply can't sit so-and-so next to so-and-so because of the incident with the futon at Rodney's bash in Hollywood and you can't put Lady what's-her-name next to the hellraiser – she'll run a mile. Most of the problems, though, appear to be caused by two women on the scene who seem to have upset everyone and hate each other so can't be seated anywhere. One of them may end up in the garden and the other in one of the outhouses.
Celebrity Bride Page 6